2010 Perce Neige Rally - Daily Log 
Based in Maniwake Quebec, 2 hours north of Ottawa, the Perce Neige Rally is the opening round of the 2010 Canadian Rally Championships. Taking place in early February, the rally provides challenging snow and ice conditions for the drivers.
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The Perce Neige Maniwaki rally is the only winter event in the Canadian Rally Championship. During the event's The Perce Neige Rally 2010 is scheduled for February 6th. For more information visit www.rallyeperceneige.com |
Car: 1987 VW Golf Group 5 - Turbo
Driver: Glen Clarke
Co-Driver: Ray Felice
Service Crew: Andy Proudfoot, Andrew Cairns, Bert Potvin
Preparation Crew: Fraser Wheeler, Istvan Okanyi, Emil Poliakov, Keese Van Winden, Andy Proudfoot, Andrew Cairns, Bert Potvin
Last fall we prepped the Golf for Roy Hopkins and Adreanne Hughes to compete in the 2009 Rally of the Tall Pines. During the event, Ray Felice and I (both working in service) lamented that we should be out on the stages. We quickly decided to enter the 2010 Canadian Rally Championship with the Golf.
We decided that the Golf should be updated to run in Group 5, which is effectively an open class for 2 wheel drive vehicles. The goal was to challenge for the Group 5 and the 2wd Canadian Championship.
To run in Group 5, we would update the drive train with a 1.8T engine and modern 02J cable shift transmission. Everyone insisted that VW parts were like lego...you just bolt them together...easy. Nothing could be farther from the truth. It is more like combining lego, megablocks and meccano set into one project. Yes a 1.8T drive train will fit into the car but significant design and fabrication was required to do it right.
Engine A 1.8T engine was secured from Emil Poliakov. Emil had built up a nice engine that put out 192hp at the wheels. It was mostly a stock build that was tuned by Chris Tapp in Ottawa. Unfortunately for Emil, his car was involved in an incident and could not be repaired. We decided to keep the engine in its current condition with stock turbo and current tune. We would not need power for Perce Neige, just driveability. The first challenge was positioning the engine in the engine bay. We fabricated new engine and transmission mounts. We installed a 3" exhaust system and high flow cat. Although we don't need this large of an exhaust system for the stock turbo, we are thinking ahead to the gravel rallies where we will want to increase our power. |
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Transmission The transmission is a VW 02J. This transmission uses a cable shift that is different from the Golf's original shift system. We took this opportunity to move the shift lever closer to the steering wheel. The transmission had an open differential and after the first test run it was apparent that a limited slip was a must. A Peloquins differential was purchased and installed. Keese Van Winden happened to drop by at the right time and I enlisted him to help with the diff change. I am used to working on Porsches, where changing the differential is very simple and takes less than 1/2hr. It took us 6hrs to change the diff in the O2J...mainly because it was the first time and we did not know what needed to be done. For the Record : Porsche 911s are much easier to work on than VW Golfs. (more like lego) |
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Suspension The car is equipped with Bilstein front shocks and Moog rear shocks. Previous testing had shown that the shocks were relatively compliant and handled the bumps fairly well. For PN we decided to keep the existing shocks so that we could focus on the engine transplant. The wheel bearings were changed and some previous impact damage was repaired. I have a test track in my back yard and in my enthusiasm, I clipped a stump which bent the passenger front control arm, spindle and tie rod. Fraser built a nice skid plate from 1/4" 6061 aluminum. It looks quite large and heavy so we dubbed it the VW tobogan. (the toboggan quality would really pay of on the final stage of the PN rally) |
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Wheels and Tires The Golf was equipped with 14 inch rims and tires. Ray felt that we should run 15" for clearance and tire availability. I purchased some Yokohama A034 snow tires from Jon Nichols in Montreal. These are considered to be the top snow tire for deep snow. We expected to need these for PN. Fitting these relatively huge tires onto the Golf was quite a task. Significant grinding and cutting was required to provide clearance for the tires. (a big hammer was also used a few times) To allow the tires to clear the front struts, we needed 20mm spacers. This required new wheel studs. Being used to buying Porsche parts, I figured this stuff would be on the shelf and available overnight. Wrong. The needed parts had to be ordered twice and arrived the evening before we were leaving for PN. The wrong studs were delivered and we had to remove and drill the spindles to make the bolts fit. This work wasn't completed until 11:30pm the night before recee. That was cutting it a bit close. |
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Safety and Interior To comply with the latest CARS regulations we added additional door bars and A-pillar supports. Fraser and Andrew did a nice job of installing the bars to keep them as unobtrusive as possible. We also installed a smaller Sparco Corsa seat for Ray. (he is so small we had to raise it up and move it forward so that he could see over the dash) The plan is to install a Sparco Evo 2 (fat bastard seat) for me but we ran out of time before PN. I continued to use my well travelled Momo rookie seat. (5 One Laps, 5 Targas + numerous GT events) The entire electrical system was replaced. A new dash was installed with dedicated instruments. (stack tach, VDO speedo, boost, water temp, oil pressure, oil temp, Lambda, battery voltage) All the fuses were replaced with circuit breakers. |
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Thank you to everyone who helped us prepare.
Glen Clarke Ray Felice
Car #40 1987 VW Golf
Special Thanks to our 2010 Sponsors:
The trip to Maniwake was a bit of an ominus start. As usual car prep took longer than normal and we did not leave the shop until 11:30pm. We needed fuel and headed to Kemptville to fill up. Unfortunately the side walks had already been rolled up and nothing was open. So we continued towards Ottawa where we ran out of fuel. I grabbed a fuel can and started walking to a service station (4km away)that CAA guaranteed us was open. After a couple km walking I began to realize how silly the sitatuion was. I had a perfectly good rally car on the trailer behind the cube truck and here I was walking to a service station at -20C. A few minutes later a police car pulled up behind me and let me know the gas station was closed. He drove me back to the truck and Andy and I unloaded the rally car and I headed off to buy some fuel. Problem solved.
We arrived in Maniwake at 3:30am and got 2hrs sleep before we had to get up and head out to recee. Situation normal.
The day was shaping up nicely...clear skies and cold weather. We spent the day inspecting the stages in Ray's (actually his wife's - good thing she wasn't riding with us) Ford Escape. Recce, as its called, consists of driving the roads at a maximum speed of 60kph while the codriver reads the route instructions. The purpose of the recce is to allow the team to create/review and perfect the instructions that will be used at speed.
Performance rallies such as Perce Neige use route instructions called Pace Notes. For those of you who have not experienced pace notes it is quite an earful. Pace notes provide detail on every aspect of the road. When the codriver is calling the pace note instructions it sounds like a non stop verbal barrage for the entire stage. Listening to and comprehending these instructions is incredibly demanding. To drive the stage at speed the driver must listen carefully and can not afford to miss a single detail. A communication mistake will quickly result in a crash.
We set some simple goals for the event.
- stay on the road
- don't break the car
- finish every stage
- win Group 5
- maximize points in 2 wheel drive championship
More than anything, I wanted to ensure that we finished the event. Speed and finishing position were not a concern. (that's hard to do when you are as competitive as I am)
The stages were incredible. The longest was 33km of tight twisty roads with lots of elevation change. The surface conditions were a mix of ice and snow.
Tire selection is very important in all forms of motorsport. The tire on the left is a Silverstone Gravel tire. With the aggressive tread pattern you would think that it would be good in the snow. Surprisingly, it has very little grip in comparison to the Yokohama A034 snow tire on the right. One of the main differences in the tire is the compound. The silverstone is very hard while the A034 is extremely soft. The A034 also has siping in the tread blocks that help grip the slippery surface. During Perce Neige, top teams actually ran an ice tire that provides even further grip. |
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Saturday morning came early. We had a quick breakfast before heading to the pre event meetings. Andy and Andrew warmed up the car and the support truck.
The temperature had dropped to -20C over night. According to the weather forecast, the afternoon was going to be -9C.
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| Start - Park Ferme | One of the many 4 wheel drive entries |
Leg 1: Stages 1 and 2
The first stage was a short town stage in Maniwake. Coming off the line I had no idea how the car would perform or handle. Would it stop? How fast could I accelerate and still be able to stop? Would it turn in on the ice?
The 2nd corner was covered with spectators and here I am driving like an old lady because I don't know what the car would do. Turning in at what I thought was a pretty slow pace, we still slid half way across the road towards the outside ditch. (later I would find out that both Pat Richard and ACP burried it in the ditch on this corner). We survived this stage and the next before heading back to 1st service.
No problems were found on the car at the first service. A fueling problem cost us a bit of time and we were a minute late getting to the start of stage 3. |
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| Andrew and Bert check the car over during 1st service |
Leg 2 : Stages 3 -8
Stage 3 and 4 were reruns of stage 1 and 2. The surfaces were much more polished than the first passes but I was starting to build more confidence in the car. Even on the icy surfaces, the left foot braking technique that I learned at O'Neil was working (most of the time).
Stage 5 Kitigan Zibi was great. I began to get a good feel of the car and started to pick up the pace. The first part of the stage was a relatively high speed run through the trees with mostly 5 and 6 corners. From the snow dust hanging in the air I could tell that we were catching the Subaru that started a minute before us and this gave me further confidence. We caught the Subaru at a L2 uphill and I overcooked the entry. The car slid into the snow bank and stalled. It took me a bit of time to get my rythym back but we caught the Subaru again where the Narini's had gone off the road. The Subaru stopped to try to pull them out and blocked the road. I tried to drive around the outside through a snow bank but got stuck. The Narinni brothers quickly pushed us out of the snow bank and we got going again.
Stage 6: Farley - The start was interesting. Lots of people were standing at the start line to watch the cars launch. When the countdown ended and I released the clutch, nothing happened. It was so icy I couldn't get the car to move. I think it took about 15 seconds before I could get the car rolling away from the line. Limited slips can only do so much. The stage was great. Spectators were everywhere standing on the snow banks. It felt like they were close enough to touch the car. The conditions were very treacherous. Every 90 degree corner had a car in the ditch. On one occassion we were lucky not to side swipe one of the competitors.
Stage 7: Blue Sea - Everything was going well until we reached a down hill off camber 5. The tires lost all traction and we just slid to the edge of the snow bank before it hooked up. Then on the final down hill into a 3 left, I had a big slide going past the apex when the front tires hooked up and set us straight towards the inside ditch. Luckily the car is pretty nimble and straightened out before I burried it. It was a good lesson: on the slippery stuff you have to make sure to keep the front wheels pointing in the direction that you want to go otherwise you will get a nasty surprise when they finally hook up.
Service 2: No problems with the car, the guys installed the lights for our first night stages.
Leg 3: Stages 8, 9, 10, 11
Our second run through Farley was a lot of fun. No cars were in the ditches and I started taking a very long tight apex around the corners to avoid the ice. When I did start to slide out I had the whole road to correct. When we got to the finish we found that the rear hatch had opened during the stage...adding much needed rear down force:) Photo Courtesy of Lewis Koberg |
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Stage 10: Kitigan Zibi - disaster strikes
We were having another good run through Kitigan Zibi. It was getting dark so I had turned on the lights. After a few km I could tell that we were having some electrical problems and thought that it might be the electrical draw caused by the rally lights. I turned them off but the problem kept getting worse. The engine was starting to cut out and eventually everythiing went black. Luckily we coasted to a stop at one of the only wide points in the road. A few spectators had a bonfire going and they helped provide some tools to fix the car.
At first I thought it was an electrical short and I tore the dash apart looking for it. I couldn't find anything wrong but when I turned the master switch on, the starter engaged. I quickly realized that the key switch had melted under the load of the normal head lights. (the main rally lights were on separate relays) Using one of the spectators leatherman tools I cut the wires off the back of the key switch and twisted them together. (just like in the movies) I could then hot wire the starter but touching the wires together. It worked and we were back in the running. Unfortunately it had taken me 25 min to fix the problem (all stage time) and car 99 reached us just as we were getting going. Luckily they saw us and waited. If they had passed us, our event would have been over.
Problems continue... A few km later I lost all the gears except 3rd and 4th. I knew the problem was in the cable shift at the shifter but I couldn't fix it until we got back to service. We finished the stage and headed for stage 11.
The approach to the Foret de l'Aigle stage is quite difficult. It is a tight uphill left hander on a hill that was covered with ice. To make matters worse, the marshall's cars were parked at the bottom of the hill and it was difficult to get a run at the hill. Having only 3rd gear, we struggled to get up the hill. The tires would either break traction and spin or I would lug the engine until it stalled. It took us 5 attempts and 13 min to get up the hill. We eventually made it but lost a lot more time.
Stage 11 Foret de l'Aigle was brutal. It was very rough and glare ice. We had no traction and the bumps just pounded the car. We finally finished the stage and headed into service at Black Rollway. The bumps inflicted some serious damage. The front passenger strut/shock had collapsed and the tires were impacting the body work. The same problem seemed to exist on the driver's side. The fenders were gettiing pounded into the body and we were starting to run an open wheel golf. |
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It also appeared that we had broken the rear engine mount as the passenger side drive shaft was now rubbing on the A-Arm. There was not much we could do except put the wheels back on and get ready for the last 3 stages. We would just have to hope that the car held together 100km or so. We were able to fix the cable shifter and now had all the gears back. |
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Leg 4: Stages 12,13,14
Stage 12 was another run through Foret de l'Aigle. It was brutally rough and icy but we made in through and returned to service for one final check over before the last two stages.
Stage 13 Tortue Nord was a great stage. At 28km it was the second longest stage of the event. We had a pretty good run passing current overall leader Leo Ulrich who had stuffed his Subaru into the snow bank. He got started again and quickly caught us. Unforunately the road was narrow and it took me a while to find a place to let him past.
Stage 14 Tortue Sud was the return trip up stage 13. It was a long wait to get to the start and we were starting to fall asleep. Everything was going well until we reached the spectator area. A tight 90 right followed by a short straight into a tight 90 left. I entered the first corner way too hot and went over the snow bank taking out the spectator tape and lots of small posts. I kept my foot in it and luckily the big VW toboggan skid plate did its job and we sledded back onto the road to keep going.
Although the technical problems experienced in the early night stages cost us a lot of time we still had a respectable finish. The car has the potential to be quick and I can certainly find more pace.
- National Overall: 25th (54 cars took the start)
- National Group 5: 1st
- Regional Overall: 10th
- Regional Group 5: 2nd
I really enjoyed the experience and look forward to round 2 - Rocky Mountain in May.
The Perce Neige will air on Global TV xx March 2010.
